We had friends before. Then we had influencers. And if Mark Zuckerberg is right, the next big thing in our social media feeds will be AI-generated content. A lot
Zuckerberg described our future feeds at Facebook’s parent company Meta’s third quarter earnings conference call on Wednesday, describing it as a natural progression.
“I think they would add a new category of content that’s either AI generated content or AI curated, or existing content that’s been curated by AI in some way,” the Meta director said. “And I think that’s going to be really exciting for Facebook and Instagram and maybe Thread, or some other kind of feed experience over time.”
Zuckerberg praised the company Great llama language model and the success of the products it powers, such as the Meta AI chatbot, which is now used by over 500 million monthly users. But Llama will play a growing role in Meta’s business, Zuckerberg said, including tools for business customers and advertisers.
As AI tools proliferate, AI content will proliferate in social media feeds. Such feeds are being actively developed within Meta, Zuckerberg noted. “It’s something where we start trying different things.”
“I don’t know if we really know what’s going to work yet, but some things are really promising,” he added. “I am very confident that this will be one of the most important trends and one of the most important applications in the coming years.”
Zuckerberg described the next wave of content for platforms as categories Facebook and Instagram.
Zuckerberg expressed how he likes the platforms Facebook and Instagram began recommending and curating content from a user’s friends and family, which Meta called its “connected” algorithm. Platforms then moved to an engagement-based algorithm, recommending content across platforms, mostly from creators and influencersTargeting meta to individual users based on various “signals”.
Next, the signs of the AI phase are already there.
Facebook is already a Meta platform where AI-generated content, sometimes referred to as “AI slop”, is becoming increasingly common. Strange images often arise aim to go viral and generate payments from Facebook’s creator program, which can be as high as $10 for every 1,000 likes on a post, according to a report by 404 Media.
While such content has been less prevalent on Instagram so far, it seems to be on its way. A report in the User Mag newsletter found an account that claims to be from a restaurant that claims to be “Austin’s #1 restaurant.” does not exist. The account is entirely AI-generated content of fake food and various photos of people, as well as a post of an image created by Jeff Bezos. Amazon The billionaire was “behind the bar” at the restaurant, “because one of our chefs is a friend of Jeff’s.”
Although the subject of the account is entirely fictional, and all of its content is not AI generated and disclosed as such, it is still active. In fact, since it was revealed to be a fantasy, the account has gained around 10,000 new followers.
Are you a meta worker or someone with an idea or tip to share? Contact Kali Hays securely the signal at +1-949-280-0267 or at kali.hays@fortune.com.
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